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DMecker authored Jan 30, 2024
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Environmental and queer activist, Nicole Lefavour, staffed fire lookouts for several years, and describes in her essay “Listening to Voices in the Wilderness” that, “The decades of lookout use show on the tree stumps and snags below. Every year we have to walk farther for the wood, the skeleton of another ancient limber pine turned to a streak of wood smoke stretches across the sky.” LeFavour shows that remaining in such a way makes one more in tune with resource use. She continues to wonder that “somewhere far away men and women in the depths of marble buildings debate our need for wilderness.” LeFavour is concerned with location and how these politicians make high-stakes decisions outside of proximity to nature.

Lookouts have a long history of producing not only lifelong lovers of the wilderness, but some of its most passionate protectors. Ray Kresek, for instance, says that he started his forestry career on a lookout and made the decision to end it there as well; in between, he established the Salmo-Priest Wilderness. However, the Forest Service announced in 2023 during a Senate Budget Committee hearing that they intend to further reduce staffed lookouts. Lookouts, <a href="https://appropriations.house.gov/legislation/hearings/budget-hearing-fiscal-year-2024-request-united-states-forest-service">according to National Budgets Director, Mark Lichtenstein</a>, will be replaced by sophisticated smoke watching cameras that are <a href="[https://keeping.onrender.com/items/mcconnel-mountain001.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/24/us/wildfires-ai-detection-california.html)" target="_blank">augmented using artificial intelligence</a>. To what extent fire lookouts will remain is uncertain, but the direction is clear; and as we reduce our reliance on human experience, I wonder how we will remain.
Lookouts have a long history of producing not only lifelong lovers of the wilderness, but some of its most passionate protectors. Ray Kresek, for instance, says that he started his forestry career on a lookout and made the decision to end it there as well; in between, he established the Salmo-Priest Wilderness. However, the Forest Service announced in 2023 during a Senate Budget Committee hearing that they intend to further reduce staffed lookouts. Lookouts, <a href="https://appropriations.house.gov/legislation/hearings/budget-hearing-fiscal-year-2024-request-united-states-forest-service">according to National Budgets Director, Mark Lichtenstein</a>, will be replaced by sophisticated smoke watching cameras that are <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/24/us/wildfires-ai-detection-california.html" target="_blank">augmented using artificial intelligence</a>. To what extent fire lookouts will remain is uncertain, but the direction is clear; and as we reduce our reliance on human experience, I wonder how we will remain.

{% include feature/video.html objectid="cold-mountain-lookout005" width="50" start="00:00:10" %}

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